1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to tracking a container and its contents and, more specifically, to locally monitoring a state of the container and its contents within a supply chain.
2. Description of Related Art
Ever-increasing global trade underscores a modem global economy which depends on goods transported in a global supply chain. Generally, a global supply chain is a network of international suppliers, manufacturers, distributors, and other entities that handle goods from their component parts to consumer consumption. For example, semiconductor testing equipment is exported from the United States to Taiwan, where semiconductors are processed and then sent to Malaysia for assembly into computers. Subsequently, the computers are shipped to warehouses in the United States, and ultimately, to consumer outlets for consumption.
However, a central system has limited visibility of containers in the global supply chain. Typically, operators at a checkpoint often manually upload reference numbers associated with containers to the central system. This high-level information may include verification that the container arrived or departed the checkpoint, and an evaluation of the container based on an external inspection, but fails to provide an evaluation of its contents. Furthermore, this information fails to account for events occurring between checkpoints that are not detectable at the checkpoint such as extreme humidity or temperatures.
Another drawback of the central system is the delay in alerts concerning the container. For example, after the operator scans and loads the container, the information must be uploaded and passed through several systems to a central database for processing. At that time the central system may realize that an alert should be raised, but there is additional delay in brining this to the attention of the operator. If the scan occurred while loading the container to a ship, the delayed alert may be too late.
Additionally, typical central systems have difficulty in collecting reliable information across heterogeneous systems. Because the information about what is happening on the container is not first-hand, and is not customized according to characteristics of the container, the central system must make inferences without an ability to verify or reevaluate information. With increasing traffic in global supply chains, and additional demands of monitoring containers, as well as contents, for economic, security, and logistic purposes, conventional central systems failed to meet these needs.
Therefore, what is needed is a decentralized state system comprising containers to automatically provide continuous and uniform monitoring of a container state. A container should be robustly configured with localized logic capable of determining a state in response to real-time events experienced by the container relative to dynamic and static event information concerning expected events.